


Getting Gas While The Mileage Lasts

by Rhidee



Category: Homestuck
Genre: A Lot Of Offscreen Drama, Alternate Universe - Road Trip, Chubby Karkat, Coping, Emotions, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, POV Dave Strider, Post-Canon Fix-It, Slow Burn, i love them and also roadtrips so here we are, the kids will be alright
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-20
Updated: 2019-11-23
Packaged: 2021-02-18 04:44:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,601
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21505396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhidee/pseuds/Rhidee
Summary: Dave goes on a roadtrip with Karkat and dodges his problems with mixed success.  His problems being: Growing up is hard and nobody understands, oh shit how do i deal with this crush, and wow childhood trauma? in MY taco bueno? It's more likely than you'd think.Also includes:Rose having issuesJade having issuesKarkat having issues but keeping them closeJohn being completely offscreen and also having issuesand the wonderful disease we call found family and finding yourself.
Relationships: Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas, past Dave Strider/Jade Harley
Comments: 17
Kudos: 55





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I tried really hard to let everyone be their own people in this, and not give everyone the same personality and i think i did? Amazingly good? I'm really proud of this.
> 
> Anyway, if you notice any glaring errors go ahead and point them out! If you absolutely love something please also point that out! What im saying is comments remind me how much i fucking love homestuck and ya'll can share that love with me at any moment.
> 
> Enjoy!

It started somewhere on the road between Roswell and Denver. This creeping feeling of weightlessness, like everything is just an idea outside the window. The rocky hills and plains spotted with trees seemed like ideas in somebody else’s mind. The hum of the engine had long faded into nothingness, filtered out as abstract sound. They drove side by side with some family’s four door, blankets shoved at the bottom edge of their back window. 

They looked considerably more competent than Dave did. All he had bought was a sheet, unprepared for how the chill of the dessert night creeped through the metal of the car and right into his bones. Karkat hadn’t brought anything at all, unless you count an illogical amount of hoodies. The last time they stopped Karkat had shoved all of his clothes around the backseat, snuggled up in them and slept. Dave leaned back, like a board, and tried to ignore the socks being shoved in his face as Karkat strew himself about.

-

They got an Airbnb in Pueblo Colorado. Because even if Airbnb’s are a treasure trove of nationwide scammers, sometimes you just need a place to stay for a night and don’t want to leave your all your possessions in a hotel parking lot. The lawn was rocks, and the larger rocks that made up the walkway were also covered in rocks, and walking on the rocks did not rock. Dave stumbled as he stepped, glanced around to see if anyone saw, and made eye contact with the beady eyes of a little tan rabbit. The eyes and the shades met and stared with equal emotionless. The rabbit sniffed at the window, did a petulant chew of hay, and turned pointedly away. Dave did not know if that was a win on his part, but damn, he wanted to think it was.

KARKAT: ARE YOU DONE MONOLOGUING, OR DO I HAVE TO TOSS MYSELF ASS FIRST INTO THE CHURNING SEA OF PEBBLES IN ORDER TO PASS THIS LEVEL OF ‘DAVE STRIDER’S BAD DECISION PUZZLE’?

He poked Dave’s back insistently and continued poking even after Dave moved.

-

Jade called somewhere in Wyoming. Dave pulled off the cracked road, into some nobody town bordered by gigantic farms.

DAVE: hi jade

JADE: DAVE!!! I was so worried about you!!

DAVE: no need harley i’m cool as a cucumber

JADE: You haven’t been replying to pesterchum and nobody is at your house!!

DAVE: yeah

JADE: Explain???

DAVE: me and nubby over here just felt like a change of pace

DAVE: just felt like our horses could be saddled in another place for a while

DAVE: and that horse is such a pesky old timey thing

DAVE: no wifi or 4g but it can do interpretive poop art

DAVE: wow look at that sucker go he’s doing it right now

DAVE: guess I better go and reign that horse in before some poor locals get so bedazzled by us that we have to stay and save the down

JADE: :(

DAVE: how are you doing that

JADE: :,(

DAVE: jade how are you doing that with sound

JADE: :,,,,,,,,,((((

DAVE: god fuck okay

DAVE: we just left

JADE: But why?

DAVE: time player stuff you wouldn’t understand

JADE: Oh, but KARKAT can understand just fine??

DAVE: 

JADE:

DAVE: harley are you…jealous?

JADE: NO!

JADE: MAYBE!

DAVE:

JADE: Sorry. I don’t really have the right to care anymore, I guess.

They stood in silence, miles and miles apart, but standing quietly together. Dave watched a tractor slowly making its way down the highway.

DAVE: he hurt me, you know?

DAVE: my bro

DAVE: i never really knew how much I was hurting until suddenly it stopped

DAVE: i figure davesprite…felt sorta the same?

JADE: He slept

JADE: A lot

JADE: I figured he was avoiding us but

JADE: I’m not sure anymore.

DAVE: im sorry im mostly not him.

JADE: Yeah.

JADE: Me too, Dave.

-

When the game ended it hadn’t felt like the end of an era. It had just felt like the end. Like somewhere, cosmically, credits were playing. That they were being left behind, as some new characters moved along. Some people who looked like them, acted like them, but weren’t them. 

The goals you have when you’re young aren’t who you’ll be forever. I promise you, reader, you’ll grow and stay the same in equal measure. It’s okay to feel like you aren’t done.

They weren’t either. They’d never be. Not until death.

Or climate change, you know, whatever comes first.

-

Sun Valley, Idaho. It had a valley, it had a sun, it did not have warm weather conditions.

KARKAT: JEGUS FUCK WHY WOULD ANYONE LIVE HERE

KARKAT: I SWEAR WHEN I SAW A POST ON YOUR HUMAN BIRD APP OF A GRUB BEING BRUSHED IN THE SNOW I DID NOT UNDERSTAND ITS CRYING

KARKAT: BUT NOW I ALSO WANT TO CRY

KARKAT: WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT

DAVE: bro I don’t know how to explain to you the complex social history behind it but basically it makes the baby stronger

KARKAT: OH I FORGOT YOUR WEIRD SPECIES HAS NO BROODING CAVERNS

KARKAT: WERE YOU ROLLED IN THE SNOW?

DAVE: no

KARKAT: OH

There was a beat of awkward silence. If angels existed they’d all be watching these two fools in the snow and being like ‘wow, that’s so awkward. I sure hope those idiots move along anywhere else at some point’, before going back to doing angelly things like tax evasion.

KARKAT: FOR THE LOVE OF US CAN WE PLEASE FIND A PLACE TO STAY

DAVE: yeah lets go

-

The Sun Valley Inn had a spa, dining, ice skating, and an outdoor pool of all things. There were statues of deer outside and a lot of windows showing the mountains. Dave got a room, thankful for the millionaires they had become after the game, and they tossed their bags on the floor before taking off their cold clothes and jumping into their respective beds.

This decision was made unanimously, but also without thought, and well.

To put it frankly?

Damn. Karkat looked nice.

Dave had seen him as a troll, obviously, but he looked all different now. And not just the skin, but his bone structure too. But notably, where there used to be a shell like thing covering muscle, there was now a very notable very soft bit of chub.

The same part of Dave’s brain who saw openings in a strife saw this tummy and went, ‘ghnk’.

And then the part of his brain that was capable of higher thought, as pushed aside as it was, shoved his head into the pillows and shouted.

KARKAT: UH

KARKAT: IS THIS A SOCIAL EXPECTATION

KARKAT: SHOULD I ALSO BE SCREAMING INTO A PILLOW

DAVE: no

DAVE: actually

DAVE: yes this is definitely the protocol

DAVE: nothing im doing is at all out of the ordinary

KARKAT: YOU KNOW YOURE SAYING THAT BUT THE MORE YOU SAY IT THE LESS I BELIEVE YOU

DAVE: maybe so

It wasn’t even like he had seen it for long, but, jesus fuck, holy shit, hot damn, that is one hot mama. OR. SOMETHING THAT IS NOT A MOTHER. Hot not-mama. Hot papa? Oh god that’s worse. Oh fuck oh shit. Hot alien friend. Sure. Let’s go with that. In fact let’s forget it was ever anything other than that.

God he missed Rose. She was out there coping and growing and Dave was.

Dave was running from his problems by looking at a whole lot of dirt across America.

He peeked up from the pillows and glanced at Karkat, who was entirely under the covers except for his hands, which were holding a trashy romance novel he had gotten at a gas station somewhere up into the light.

Okay. Maybe this road trip wasn’t a bad idea. Just a moment of doubt, no biggy. He probably wasn’t avoiding his problems anyway. Don’t even worry about it.

Dave fell asleep watching Karkat’s pages turn.

-

When he woke up it was night. Karkat wasn’t in the other bed, or in his bed, or anywhere else you could see from the bed. Dave felt a spike of worry, tugging his cold socks on and taking his blankets with him. 

He found Karkat sitting outside, for some awful reason. There wasn’t much air pollution, so the stars shone above. Dave grabbed an extra blanket that was on the couch and stepped outside.

DAVE: do you know how cold it is out here?

Karkat startled and looked at him. He blinked like he was in a daze, and then took one of Dave’s blankets. He looked back to the sky and spoke quietly.

KARKAT: I DON’T REALLY GET YOUR MEASUREMENTS, BUT IT CERTAINLY FEELS COLD.

DAVE: its really cold

DAVE: do you wanna go inside?

KARKAT: NO, I

KARKAT: I FEEL A BIT HOMESICK

KARKAT: THIS HELPS

DAVE: oh

He hesitated, and then dropped another blanket on Karkat, wrapping his ears up extra so they didn’t get frosty. Karkat made a constipated face but didn’t protest.

KARKAT: THANKS

They sat a bro amount apart. Two bros, sitting on a balcony, about four inches apart because they’re not gay and also the balcony wasn’t that big and only had one bench.

They sat for a while. Dave watched the mist flow out as they breathed. Thought about a million things that he could have been, a million dead daves, and a million tiny bits of moisture in the air. He watched them fade.

DAVE: do you ever worry that you’re stuck? 

Karkat looked over.

KARKAT: WHAT?

DAVE: i don’t know

DAVE: just that

DAVE: we’ve already grown as much as we can

DAVE: and now the world is going to change rapidly around us

DAVE: and one day we’re going to wake up some crummy old conservatives

DAVE: starting lawsuits over okay boomer and not tipping our waitresses

DAVE: laughing at neopronouns and pretending we understand foreign politics

Dave looked like he could go on, but the sound of the night didn’t invite new sound.

KARKAT: DAVE

KARKAT: WHAT ARE YOU ON ABOUT

KARKAT: WHY WOULD YOU CHANGE ALL YOUR OPINIONS SUDDENLY AND BE A JACKASS IN NEW WAYS

Dave huffed.

DAVE: just, look

DAVE: in the game we had to change all the time

DAVE: everything we did had a goal, everything we didn’t do had a goal, everything we did changed stuff

DAVE: now we’re on earth and we’re

DAVE: so small

DAVE: we cant change fast enough

DAVE: maybe we never were impressive anyway. maybe we were just made to win.

KARKAT: THAT’S DUMB

KARKAT: DAVE,

DAVE: listen karkat if you’re just going to be rude to me for twenty minutes-

KARKAT: NO IM

Karkat hunched a bit. He looked like a blanket pile with hair. It kind of made it hard to stay irritated.

KARKAT: SORRY

KARKAT: ITS JUST

KARKAT: I UNDERSTAND

KARKAT: SORT OF

KARKAT: STOP ME IF IM EATING LOADGAPERS BUT

DAVE: hehe butt

God does anyone have some spare impulse control? Just a little spare impulse control in this trying time.

KARKAT:

KARKAT: LOOK, I DIDN’T EXPECT TO LIVE LONG AT ALL

KARKAT: WHY WOULD I? I’M A MUT- I WAS A MUTATED FREAK

KARKAT: BUT NOW IT SEEMS LIKE EVERYONE IS THE MUTATED FREAK

KARKAT: AND WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE AT ABOUT THE SAME TIME

KARKAT: AND WHAT THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH ALL THAT TIME

KARKAT: I THOUGHT I’D BE DEAD BEFORE I REACHED 7 SWEEPS

KARKAT: WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH AT LEAST 20 MORE?

KARKAT: WHAT MORE COULD I POSSIBLY SQUEEZE OUT OF MY BROKEN BODY TO MAKE MY TIME WORTH IT?

DAVE: yeah

DAVE: what are we supposed to do with all this time?

DAVE: everything about who we are was already decided before we were born

DAVE: i was trained

DAVE: i

DAVE: i was abused for years

DAVE: i was made to be perfect for the game

DAVE: but i did it and

DAVE: jesus

DAVE: what the fuck do i do now

KARKAT: YEAH

They sat for a while. The night moved along, clouds dragging through the sky in slow streaks. The moon made everything lit well enough, dragging outlines from the dark. They just sat. Two kids who became two adults and didn’t figure themselves out along the way.

Softly, Karkat leaned over. Rested his messy curls on Dave’s shoulder.

And they said nothing at all.

-

In the morning, Dave booted up his phone to a bunch of notifications. He skimmed, clicked the most recent, and started talking to Rose. He didn’t have the energy to read the backlog.

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT] –

TG: im not dead

TT: What a pleasantly shocking piece of information. How nice of you to grace me with your presence.

TG: im sensing a bit of sarcasm wafting off your #b536da text

TG: it tastes like you’re mad

TT: It also tastes like you have been talking to Terezi, as opposed to your darling sister.

TG: actually i haven’t

TG: it just rubbed off on me

TG: like her, lets talk about that extensively

TT: And take away our chance to discuss why you disappeared off into the night with Karkat?

TT: Without so much as a return address?

TG: i mean to be fair we havent exactly settled

TT: David. You scared the shit out of me.

TG: oh grap

TG: crap

TG: I mean oh fuck

TT: I was really scared. I thought I’d lost you. I thought maybe permanently.

TG: jesus rose im so sorry

TT: I cant see anything anymore

TT: If you died I wouldn’t know.

TT: You could get in a car wreck and I wouldn’t know until I saw it on the news or someone managed to track down our relation.

TT: Which is extremely unlikely.

TG: i

TG: didnt think of it like that

TT: There’s no do overs now. There’s no second chances. Do you even care?

TG: jesus rose

TG: of course I care

TG: i just had to get away for a while

TT: With Karkat.

TG: with karkat

TG: i wasnt going to just leave him in texas rose

TT: I

TT: Guess that makes sense.

TT: Sorry I think I’m more flustered than I thought I’d be.

TG: are you okay?

TT: No

TG: Oh

TG: do you want to….talk about it?

TT: No.

TT: But I should.

TT: Sorry.

TG: no don’t worry about it dr strider md is in the house

TG: imagine me getting out a little notebook to scribble down all your thoughts

TG: and also your shirt

TG: I’m channeling the powers of the smartest psychology broad i know and with her power on my side i know I can crack these issues right open

TG: 100 percent have this covered

TT: I think

TT: That’s my problem.

TT: For a long time I was really caught up in this idea that because I could see other peoples issues that meant I could also see my own.

TT: And that since I could understand them I understood myself.

TT: I

TT: was wrong.

TT: After a while you can’t ignore your flaws when they’re staring back at you

TT: And sometimes your flaws look like six bottles of wine and a martini glass.

TG: are you sober

TT: Yeah.

TT: I uh.

TT: I got all the alcohol I could find and tossed it down the waterfall

TT: and then cried.

TT: And then shoved my face in some rumcake and inhaled the smell for ten minutes.

TT: And then tossed that over the waterfall and cried some more.

TT: It was stupid.

TG: you did a good job

TG: its okay to get all emotional

TT: I should be better than all of that.

TG: youre human, sis

TG: and uh

TG: to have a real shit moment

TG: people will love you even when you’re not perfect

TG: i’ll love you even when shits fucked

TG: i promise

TG: ugh ugh see this rose im getting emotion hives, better bust out an epipen stat before I die of feelies

TG: here lies dave strider, dead from genuine emotional output

TT: Heh

TT: I love you too, Dave.

TT: You’re a good brother.

TG: youre a good sister idiot now can we please stop expressing our emotions im serious about the hives

TT: I don’t know, what does dr strider prescribe?

TG: im looking at this paper and it says the lack of a father figure in your life is the cause of all your issues and also your toilet training was too harsh or lax so youre anally fixated

TT: Ugh, Freud.

TG: okay but i really think you need someone with you so you might want to get someone to come over

TT: I understand that intellectually but emotionally I’d rather die than be vulnerable in person.

TG: god we really are related

TT: Two peas in a trauma pod, brother dearest.

TG: riding this pod down the mistake river right into the oh shit whats going on bend

TT: Swerving around in a wild metaphor for ill thought out decisions while also being a phallic symbol.

TT: Speaking of phallic symbols,

TG: oh jeez

TT: Let’s talk about Karkat.

TG: nevermind lets discuss how you feel out of control do you think its because you never got attention as a child so you never learned emotional cause and effect

TT: No I like my idea better.

TG: are you sure because I channeled all my brain energy into that psychoanalysis I just did

TT: I already mentioned my alcoholic breakdown I refuse to open up about my childhood trauma until you level grind xp to reach the final boss.

TG: its so wild when you speak my language

TT: I love you too

TG: ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

TT: So, Karkat.

TG: okay I guess if analyzing my big gay feelings will help you cheer up then i can take this one for the team

TT: Do you often think about ‘taking it’ for the team?

TG: is that a sex joke or calling out that im recovering from a martyr complex

TT: Yes.

TG: ah… multitrack drifting

TT: You’re avoiding the question.

TG: fine

TG: i think i llllll

TG: like him.

TG: a lot

TT: You love him? My, this is serious.

TG: listen okay i don’t know he just

TG: he isn’t even doing anything

TG: in fact he’s been really quiet for some reason

TG: but he’ll just be there in the seat watching stuff go by or reading his stupid novels and he looks

TG: happy

TG: like just being here is enough to make him be sorta okay

TG: i mean othertimes he looks like he’s thinking really hard and maybe having a crisis

TG: but mostly it’s the first one and i’ll just be looking at him and my heart will lurch

TG: he farted for the first time and it scared the shit out of him and im not kidding i was about to get on my knees and propose or some shit

TT: Kananya told me a similar story about herself. Admittedly it invoked the same emotions in me.

TG: oh gross i don’t want to hear about kanayas farts

TT: But Karkat’s farts are heavenly?

TG: well okay i didn’t say it wasn’t gross but

TG: shit okay im walking down a short road to a long psychoanalysis lets just say his normal things mean a lot to me

TG: also sometimes he’ll get pissed at a book and he’ll sorta chatter, like he’s trying to growl but he doesn’t have the parts for it, and it sorta should scare me but it just makes me feel safe

TT: Have you considered sharing this with him?

TG: oh god no way rose holy shit

TG: i cant do that

TG: first of all i dont want to make things weird and force him to turn me down or worse say yes because he feels sorry for me

TG: secondly hes literally a captive audience you don’t hit on people when they cant run away

TT: Nothing about who Karkat is has led me to believe he wouldn’t run out into the woods, middle fingers blazing, and come out as the leader of some jungle tribe made up of cryptids.

TG: oh god do you think this world has bigfoot? im pretty sure the og earth didnt but there is a non zero chance this world has bigfoot

TT: Dave, I’m saying you should ask him out.

TG: i don’t want to do that when he’s isolated

TT: Unlike some idiots, he’s not. He’s been messaging everybody each night.

TG: really?

TT: Mostly the trolls, but after jade yelled about it in a group chat with Vriska in it, she said that Terezi said that Aradia said that Sollux said he was fine, even though he’s barely talking to Kanaya for some reason.

TG: i didn’t know aradia talked to terezi

TT: I think they’re trying to set up detective agency where Aradia does autopsy’s and Terezi uses that information to solve crimes. Neither of them have any sort of degree, but apparently you don’t need a degree to become a coroner.

TG: i cant believe we died for this

TT: It is kind of ‘wack’.

TT: Regardless, you should message everyone more. And talk to Karkat.

TT: About your feelings specifically. Not about coroners in america.

TG: yeah sure I’ll definitely do that.

-

DAVE: did you know coroners don’t need a degree

KARKAT: WHAT THE HELL IS A CORONER

-

A definite downside to long country wide road trips is the part where you have to think. It’s almost meditative, driving down long highways for hours on end. If bro hadn’t made him watch some pretty gnarly drivers ed videos he’d probably be experiencing some significant highway hypnosis, but instead he was checking his mirrors every once and a while and doing his best to stay aware. He’d talk to Karkat, but he was dozing in the backseat, in a pile of clothes that also included Dave’s. And, wow, is that Dave’s dirty shirt? He almost wished he still wore one outfit all the time so he could pretend it wasn’t, but that was definitely a shirt he had sweated on.

Dave wondered if that meant something.

Then he abruptly, like a boot to the head, remembered that Karkat was totally wigging out at the hotel like four days ago, and then he had completely forgotten because he had talked to Rose. Holy shit. The award for the shortest attention span goes to this guy. So sad he won’t be able to get it because he already forgot such an award existed, and also that he was nominated, who nominated him, and where he lives.

Homesick. That’s a weird thing to feel before talking about how your planet literally wanted you dead since your birth.

Dave didn’t. Know if he felt that. He did sometimes, of course, for little things. It was bad but it was…habitual. There was a script. There wasn’t a script now. Every time he opened a fridge in a hotel room he tensed a little. Not that he had opened a lot of them, they were usually empty, but. He forgot for a few seconds.

It wasn’t like everything had been all bad. Dave remembered the first time he had landed a hit on his bro. It wasn’t an amazing hit, just tore his shirt a bit, but the strife had stopped and bro. Well he didn’t smile. But he seemed pleased. Maybe. It’s possible Dave was just projecting, like putting the smile on the mona lisa. But they had gotten taco bell that night, only a few smuppets fell when he opened the bag. And he felt happy. He really did. He didn’t even feel like all the ‘weird stuff’ was worth noting. He just was trying to note it more, to himself, because seeing his friends houses without anything actively hazardous made him sort of feel like he should note it.

And well. He knew bro loved him. He had to have cared about his survival, to try to train him and to feed him. Why waste time strifing someone if you don’t care at all? If bro hated him he would’ve just left him somewhere.

But.

He wasn’t better than everyone else in the game. He wasn’t even sure if all that had put him above average. For a bit he thought that, maybe he was just extra weak, and bro had to train him extra because of it, to get him on the level of everyone else. But, John honestly wasn’t that high level, and he did fine. His dad served him cakes and shit, and John definitely loved the dude. 

Dave wasn’t sure he cared even half as much when his bro died. 

But, fuck, Karkat. Dave missed some of it, he missed the habit, and maybe that’s what Karkat missed to? He felt like maybe this could go faster if he actually talked to Karkat about it, but lo and behold, still sleeping like a stinky baby.

Yeah okay. This can wait.

-

Monroe, Utah. Population: Who knows. Dave was honestly busy being startled at just how many goddamn mountains there were in America. Texas didn’t really have many, and he’d been up to Oklahoma like once and the mountains he saw were in the distance, and suddenly he was a five minute drive away from a mountain at basically all times.

Monroe was surrounded by national parks and looked like old timey western paintings of the horizon. They stopped at this place called the Marysvale Motel, which not only was one of the cheapest places that came up, but it also looked absolutely cartoonish and Dave still had enough connection to irony that he HAD to stay there. The office was labeled as such with old timey western cartoon style font, the beds had quilts with a combination floral and geometric pattern, and the walls were wood plank.

KARKAT: DAVE?

DAVE: yeah dude?

Karkat pulled out a condom, unopened, from a drawer. 

KARKAT: THE FUCK IS THIS?

Dave choked, sputtered, choked again, and then slam dunked the thing into the trash.

DAVE: okay dude when a man and a women or two non gender specified std hating individuals love each other for at least one night

KARKAT: HOLY SHIT WAS THAT A FUCKING HUMAN BUCKET

DAVE: probably that is the closest equivalent

KARKAT: BLEK!

Oh god that face was cute.

KARKAT: WHY WOULD ANY ROT PANNED INDIVIDUAL LEAVE THEIR HUMAN COOPULATION MATERIALS LYING AROUND IN A FUCKING MOTEL ROOM

DAVE: they probably just forgot it it wasn’t like it was used

KARKAT: WAIT HOW LITTLE OF

KARKAT: UH

KARKAT: NEVERMIND

DAVE: dude I know you have access to the internet have you seriously not looked up the finer points of your baby cannon

DAVE: your ham slammer

DAVE: your meat scepter

KARKAT: GOD PLEASE SAY YOURE DONE

DAVE: lance of love, one eyed rattlesnake, disco stick

DAVE: skin flute, womb broom, king dong, hot rod

DAVE: obtuse, rubber goose, green moose, guava juice

DAVE: giant snake, birthday cake, large fry, chocolate shake

KARKAT: THERES NO WAY ALL OF THOSE ARE SLANG FOR A PENIS

DAVE: oh god why do you know the word

DAVE: also we totally do use all of those words why would I lie

KARKAT: I DONT KNOW, FOR FUN?

KARKAT: ALSO I DID GOOGLE IT I JUST DIDN’T GOOGLE IT LIKE THAT

KARKAT: I GOOGLED IT BECAUSE I HAD TO PEE AND THIS BODY DOES NOT WORK THE SAME

DAVE: okay im just imagining you desperately googling it while hiding in a bathroom and thats hilarious

KARKAT: YEAH THE INTERNET DID NOT HAVE THE ANSWERS I WAS LOOKING FOR

KARKAT: IT THOUGHT I HAD AN ENLARGED

KARKAT: WHATEVER THAT ASS GLAND IS

DAVE: did you seriously find the prostate before you found condoms

KARKAT: YES

DAVE: holy shit

Karkat stared as Dave fucking lost it into his hands.

Wow, Karkat thought, Karkatly.

I guess I love this dorkass.

-


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so maybe agreeing to go with Dave on this wild road trip wasn’t completely fucking magnanimous, sue him!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to my lovely boyf PanDisasterMan  
> for ghost writing what it's like to drive in Cali traffic, please go check out zir fics if you like good omens or good ass crossovers!
> 
> Also while im here i just want y'all to know Google maps is how i got info on all of these locations except Cali and Texas stuff, so if you get bored and want to search up where to buy Dave's stuff you can

KARKAT: WELL

KARKAT: THATS ANTICLIMATIC

Somewhere uncomfortably close to Washington (the state, not the capital, even Dave would notice a culture shift as big as that) they had mutually agreed to say fuck it to destinations and just start driving completely randomly. Or, rather, following whatever the nearest gas station said about tourist destinations.

The Hoover Dam was very large very dammy, and especially boring.

DAVE: it's a dam shame

KARKAT: OH, FUCK YOU

They stood on this big bridge overlooking the dam. It was kinda cool, although they both would hate to admit it, but more because of the scenery in the distance than the dam itself.

DAVE: are you sure you dont want to go on the tour?

KARKAT: I ALREADY GAVE THEM TEN DOLLARS FOR PARKING AND THAT’S ENOUGH

DAVE: i mean technically that was my money

KARKAT: SAME DIFFERENCE

He was right.

KARKAT: WELL FUCK IT

KARKAT: WHERE’S THE GIFTSHOP IN THIS PLACE

-

There was, in fact, a giftshop AT the dam. But they couldn’t find the dam thing, because they had one dam braincell between them. So they went to the hoover dam store.

DAVE: holy shit

A lot of the buildings in the area had orangish rounded arches, that was not what was special about the shop. There also were a lot of tables with umbrellas, also not what was special about the hoover dam store. No, what was special?

DAVE: look karkles its you

Was that it was right next to the flying saucer. An alien loving, completely unapologetic store.

KARKAT: FUCK YOU, FUCK THIS, AND FUCK NEVADA. I CANT BELIEVE IM SAYING THIS BUT CAN WE PLEASE GO LOOK AT THE DAM STORE.

DAVE: hehe, dam

Dave took a selfie with the alien figure mounted on the wall, mid conversation, duck face and all. Karkat looked on with disgust, and also, a gross amount of affection. Yuck! Let’s bottle that up and forget about it like last years grubcake.

KARKAT: I THOUGHT YOU SAID THAT AREA 51 WAS WHERE ALIENS WERE

DAVE: thats what I thought but that’s not stopping these freaks

DAVE: come on, please?

Dave made a very exaggerated pouty face. His mouth migrated down to levels that defy human physics, his shades seemed to be hit by the sun like light glistens in a puppies eyes. DisGOSting.

Karkat folded like a paper plate.

KARKAT: FINE, IF IT ENDS MY SUFFERING

Dave went back to pokerfacing around all pokerfacey, and went inside at a speed slightly above his normal ironic swagger. The bell jingled when they went in, and an employee rapidly pretended to not have been watching them through the windows.

DAVE: this is a gold mine

DAVE: i don’t know why they say the gold rush is over because obviously we should all be clamoring for this choice gold right here

KARKAT: I HAVE NO CLUE WHAT YOURE TALKING ABOUT AND I DONT CARE

DAVE: its okay i know your eyes are blinded from all this choice choice merch

He held up a small tin, proclaiming themselves to be alien poop mints. Karkat made a disgusted face, but countered by holding up a UFO cruisin’ license. The challenge was accepted.

-

After a variety of knickknacks, gewgaws and whim-whams the two walked out. Dave held, with no small amount of pride, an alien plush. It had a mohawk and was cherry red. It was a foot long and he cradled it like a child.

DAVE: hes going to be the coolest kid in school

DAVE: hes going to walk in day one in heelies and everyone will be kneeling at his feet

DAVE: ‘oh please sir janthony can I share my animal crackers with you’

DAVE: ‘oh janthony if we play house you can be the dog’

KARKAT: THE DOG?

DAVE: barkbeast, whatever

KARKAT: NO I MEAN WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU WANT TO BE THE DOG

DAVE: treats, duh

Karkat had grabbed a book titled Haunted Las Vegas. It had the reading tone of a mystic traveler, wearing nikes, telling about how their cousins bar mitzvah was totally wild and had no less than ten elephants. No, really, “Where else can you find a town haunted by both Elvis and an elephant (that’s right, an elephant)?”.

Karkat took off his shoes before climbing into the back, tossing them randomly in the front seat. Dave set Janthony in the front seat, and buckled him.

KARKAT: WOW

KARKAT: I HAVENT WORN A SEATBELT PROPERLY IN DAYS AND ITS FINE

KARKAT: BUT THE DOLL HAS TO BUCKLE UP?

DAVE: hes baby

DAVE: well

DAVE: they is baby

DAVE: who really knows this aliens gender they’re an alien

DAVE: maybe its on a scale we don’t understand and has completely different associations

KARKAT: DID YOU FORGET IM AN ALIEN

KARKAT: WAS AN ALIEN

DAVE: no

DAVE: okay yes but what if

DAVE:

DAVE: lol

KARKAT: WHAT ARE YOU ON ABOUT

DAVE: nothing dont worry about it

DAVE: the alien poop mints got to me

KARKAT:

He shrugged and focused on shoving all their clothes out of the way. The concept of ‘your bag’ and ‘my bag’ had almost entirely disappeared, minus a few pockets of like, deodorant and stuff. Now it was a free for all, a wild sorting of wherever the fuck stuff fit.

Karkat… liked this.

A lot.

Okay, so maybe agreeing to go with Dave on this wild road trip wasn’t completely magnanimous, sue him! He could have totally asked to be dropped off at almost anywhere, hell, he could have stole a boat and fucked off to Jade’s island with most of the merry band of idiots he knew. But, well, Dave had a hard look in his eyes. He had been crawling up the walls at the penthouse, shoving a bunch of human nonsense into garbage bags, sitting and staring at nothing. It was…concerning.

It filled Karkat with pity. But human pity, which tasted weird, and sort of haughty.

…love?

Urgh.

Being a human was, to put it simply, ‘wild’.

-

KARKAT: WAIT A MINUTE

KARKAT: DAVE?

DAVE: yeah dude?

KARKAT: WHERE DID YOU GET THIS CAR?

DAVE:

KARKAT: …DAVE?

KARKAT: DAVE

KARKAT: DAVE SERIOUSLY WHERE DID YOU GET THIS CAR

-

KARKAT: BUT TROLL KIRSTIE ALLEY DOESN’T EVEN PITY HIM!

KARKAT: THE WRITERS ARE JUST SO BULGE DEEP IN SUBVERTING THE LINES BETWEEN KISMESIS AND MATESPRITE THAT THEY FORGOT TO WRITE AN ACTUALLY GOOD STORY

KARKAT: AND WHEN TROLL TED DANSON FUCKS OFF ON A BOAT TO JOIN HIC’S ARMADA?

KARKAT: OBVIOUSLY A GOVERNMENT ORDERED PROPAGANDA SHIFT

KARKAT: THEY PROBABLY CULLED ALL THE WRITERS ON THE FIRST SEASON AND THAT’S WHY THE SECOND ONE IS A STRAIGHT UP CLONE!

DAVE: i dont know im pretty sure they did the same thing here and theres no way it shook out like that

KARKAT: IF YOU REALLY THINK YOUR HUMAN GOVERNMENT IS COMPLETELY OUT OF THE MEDIA YOURE MORE PAN ROTTED THAN I THOUGHT

DAVE: aww you dont think im that dumb? hold me kark im swooning

KARKAT: NOT WHILE YOURE DRIVING YOURE NOT

KARKAT: AND KARK? WAS THAT ON PURPOSE OR DID YOU CHOKE ON THE WEIGHT OF YOUR DUMBASSERY MID WORD

DAVE: i could choke on something else if youd like

DAVE: aha

DAVE: i mean

KARKAT: FINALLY THE SWERVE INSTINCT, IF ONLY IT HAD ACTIVATED BEFORE YOU DECIDED TO MAKE KISMESIS OVERTURES

DAVE: what im not doing kismesis overtures this is a one hundred present overtures free zone there is such a lack of overtures lil old ladies are being scammed into buying them online

DAVE: but they open up the mail like thank you george and the box is empty and all filled with all the horrors of the world

DAVE: a pandoras box of malware watch out this little old lady just discovered docking and she likes it

KARKAT: WHAT THE FUCK IS DOCKING AND PLEASE TELL ME ITS BOAT RELATED

DAVE: its

DAVE: its definitely boat related

KARKAT: THANK GOG OR GOD OR OTHER NONSPECIFIED DIETY

DAVE: thank john

KARKAT: SURE THANK JOHN

-

California, when it decided to be a city, decided to really be a city. It honestly reminded Karkat of some of the cities in alternia, but with a lot more living hiveless than dead hiveless. There were a lot of hives, no free land, and a shitload of weird alternating styled apartments. Also, dog parks. Lots of dog parks. Never in where you’d expect.

DAVE: okay maybe this is shitty but i’ll admit i’m surprised they’re allowed to be in public

KARKAT: THE HIVELESS?

DAVE: yeah homeless hiveless whatever

DAVE: in texas we don’t really have homeless people? Like

DAVE: we have them but we arrest them if they’re seen, sorta

DAVE: we have a lot of curfews

KARKAT: THAT’S WEIRD

KARKAT: ON ALTERNIA ITS EITHER YOU GET LEFT ALONE OR SOME HIGHBLOOD WITH MURDER EYES TAKES OFFENSE TO YOUR SMELL AND ENDS YOU

DAVE: yeah okay that sucks but it reminds me

DAVE: fuck cops

KARKAT: FUCK COPS?

DAVE: fuck cops

KARKAT: YEAH OKAY THAT TRACKS FUCK COPS

The car comes to a stop under a freeway overpass. There’s a group of homeless congregated under the industrial hub above. There are tents, wooden boards, shopping carts, and coolers lining the sidewalk. More than that, they are sitting around a small charcoal grill and talking. Under the mural of “community” and “upstanding citizenship” the homeless individuals offer a picture more genuine than the empty hues on dingy walls.

KARKAT:

The light turns green and the car drives on. There are fancy and clean store fronts with “No Shoes, No Shirts, No Service” signs in big bold font. The California brand traffic is acting up, and Karkat sort of wishes they had stayed out of the city longer. They sit in traffic around restaurants with paying customer only policies for the bathroom. Benches line the sidewalks with purposely portioned bars to keep people from laying down. Its dumb. It’s all dumb, and cruel, and pointless. The stark difference between the cheery, bright presentation and the subtle signs of hostility towards homeless people gives it a post-apocalyptic feel, but its not post anything, its now.

Someone is walking around with an orange vest and a black toolbox. The people that pass the man pay him no mind as he crouches by the benches and produces a screwdriver from the box and disassembles the bars. The man deposits both bar and screws in his toolbox before moving onto the next seat.

DAVE: okay jesus

DAVE: its like we walked into a bizarrely intense socio-political commentary on homeless injustice in California

KARKAT: YEAH I KNOW WE’VE BEEN IN THE COUNTRY FOR ALMOST THIS ENTIRE TIME BUT I DON’T THINK EVERWHERE IS LIKE THIS

DAVE: well okay

DAVE: im pretty sure everything just sucks in different ways

DAVE: plus a lot of lgbt+ people get tossed into the streets and im pretty sure shelters aren’t safe for them

KARKAT: LGBT PLUS?

DAVE: okay wow i don’t know how to get started with that one

DAVE: you might wanna google it

KARKAT: HOW COMPLEX CAN IT POSSIBLY BE

-

KARKAT: HOLY SHIT

-

KARKAT: DAVE ARE YOU AN LGBT ALLY

DAVE: yeah lets go with that

-

Venice beach was just, wow. Karkat and Dave had parked in the worlds smallest parking lot, made that way from the shameless metal maze of cars. Everything looked like an early 2000s website, with vastly different fonts and pictures all next to each other. Everything felt like an early 2000s website too, loading in jumps and starts, people glitching about. Karkat watched someone haphazardly toss their leftover fries to a seagull, creating a swarm.

DAVE: im getting you churros

KARKAT: ID RATHER YOU BE GETTING ME THE FUCK OUT OF HERE

DAVE: im getting you churros and a quiet place

KARKAT: THANKS

The bustle of people and mishmash of shops really did not cease for a moment, and Karkat grabbed Dave’s hand. Dave pulled him along, like a lifeboat, like a necessity, and this was exactly like in A Lowblooded Subjugglator Meets And Woes A Highblooded Spleenfowl Herder Over The Course Of yada yada yada. All this human stuff couldn’t compare to the pure artform of troll literature, but it did make it tiring to monologue the plot, especially now that Dave was handing him some sort of sugary nonsense, probably a churro, that was being sold by a lady with a cart.

DAVE: alright lets go

-

On the actual beach it was surreally peaceful. The noise didn’t fully waft over, and Karkat could almost see where stuff was located. He saw, haha, wow, a fucking muscley man lifting women? Dave was totally bullshitting him when he said that was only a movie thing, he fucking knew it.

KARKAT: IM RIGHT ALL THE TIME

DAVE: probably not but okay

Dave took a bite of his own churro. They were still holding hands, which would be awkward if either of them tuned into their physical forms for even one second. But they didn’t, so their hands stayed quietly interlocked, as they sat in the sand and let it get permanently embedded in their shoes.

KARKAT: I THINK

KARKAT: I THINK I MISS GAMZEE

DAVE: what, bro, no

DAVE: you were totally valid to break up with him

DAVE: he didnt like, do anything for you

DAVE: and also he murdered a bunch of people but honestly it seems like everyone did

KARKAT: YOU KNOW

KARKAT: I HONESTLY CANT REMEMBER IF I KILLED ANYONE?

KARKAT: I GUESS A LOT OF THE GAMES MECHANICS WERE SEMI SENTIENT BUT LIKE

KARKAT: I DID A LOT MORE KILLING BEFORE I ENTERED THE GAME, IN BETWEEN RUNNING LIKE A CLUCKBEAST WITH ITS HEAD CUT OFF

DAVE: chicken

KARKAT: YEAH, THAT

KARKAT: A REALLY DUMB CHICKEN SCRAMBLING ABOUT

They sat in silence for a moment.

DAVE: i don’t think you were a dumb chicken

Karkat snorted and started laughing, dropping his head in his knees.

DAVE: okay that sounded dumb

KARKAT: PFFT, YOU THINK?

KARKAT: ITS OKAY, I THINK YOU WERE A NOT DUMB CHICKEN TOO

DAVE: hell yeah im the finest chicken in the coop

DAVE: im getting it like that one chicken in chicken run who was with the circus or some shit

DAVE: running around like some great escape artist, making all the lady chickens swoon

KARKAT: YOURE RIDICULOUS

He said it like ‘I love you’, which, oops. Dave caught it enough to blush, going slightly pink under his preexisting beginning-of-sunburn. He looked away, eyes scanning the horizon. It was like the sky was evenly split into two shades of blue, the division a straight line between them. There weren’t any boats visible, just the cresting waves and some swimmers.

Karkat went to run his hand through the sand, abruptly realized he was still holding Dave’s, and pulled away.

Now there were two idiots avoiding each other’s eyes with blushes on the beach. 

“Shit” they thought, in tandem.

“There’s no way he likes me like that.”

-

He totally missed Gamzee. And wow, wasn’t that a kicker, that you can spend sweeps thinking about every pan rotted act of dumbass cruelty someone did and still care about them. It was just like in troll of mice and men when that highblood accidentally scorned the affections of his lowblood moirail when he killed a lowblood in a barn. 

Actually that narrative is uncomfortably similar, time to read Consort of the Werewolf King.

Karkat successfully bottled up his emotional meltdown by opening the kindle app and rolling down the window a little.

-

Dave’s hair was getting longer. Like, down to his shoulders longer. Karkat didn’t think this was comfortable, especially as they drove down to warmer climates, but when he’d offered some gas station scissors to cut it Dave had just started talking about how John had messaged him and said that Dadbert had gotten Sollux some wild gaming rig that took up like, half of the living room Dave! And now dad played smash bros!

Karkat figured he was mostly grumpy because he’d lost, and when he’d said that Dave had snorted.

Karkat loved that, the moments where Dave let himself feel visibly. He knew better than most that showing you cared about something was a weakness. Of course he did, why do you think he yelled so much? It wasn’t some eastern alternian tsundere trope, it’s a valid fucking defense mechanism, Nepeta!

-

DAVE: so hypothetically

DAVE: if i wore a dress would you care

KARKAT: I HAVE NO IDEA WHY YOU’D WEAR SOMETHING THAT IMPEDES YOUR MOVEMENTS BUT NO NOT REALLY

DAVE: i think maybe that’s part of it

DAVE: like

DAVE: we’ve been driving for ages and we haven’t fought anybody

DAVE: i think maybe we don’t need that part of us anymore?

KARKAT: I DON’T KNOW

KARKAT: I FEEL LIKE THAT’D BE LETTING DOWN PAST KARKAT AND ALL HIS WORK

KARKAT: NOT THAT MUCH OF IT TRANSFERRED TO THIS BROWN SQUISHY FORM BUT STILL

DAVE: i feel like after he finished freaking out

DAVE: little me would be pretty impressed

DAVE: like, who can say they can rock both dude jeans and a skirt?

KARKAT: YOU, I GUESS

DAVE: haha, yeah

KARKAT: MAYBE I'LL GET A SKIRT TOO

KARKAT: WHO KNOWS WE HAVE TIME

DAVE: huh

DAVE: we sure do

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EVERY MOMENT IS A SNAPSHOT IN OUR INFINITELY LONG LIVES AND THERE IS NO END ONLY THE NEXT MOMENTS BEGINNING anyway i love them and sorry the icon that is janthony isnt in this more

**Author's Note:**

> I know it has some stuff unresolved, but life is always unresolved. They're going to keep going. They're doing to figure out what they need, and by god, they're going to fucking get it.
> 
> (Also this work is only like 250 words shorter than the 20 page essay on trans connection with inhuman narratives i wrote SO)
> 
> Also i had to cut this because the timeline of the fic isnt long enough, but: Daves hair is growing long throughout the course of this roadtrip and towards the end of it he has a gendercrisis and comes out of it genderfluid. Im not sorry and i do make the rules.


End file.
